


Weaponized

by AbelQuartz



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Adult Connie Maheswaran, Adult Steven Universe, Blood, Blood and Injury, Broken Bones, Combat, F/M, Gladiatorial combat, Implied Kidnapping, Inspired by Fanart, Mind Control, Public Execution, connverse - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 23:15:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10932051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AbelQuartz/pseuds/AbelQuartz
Summary: After the Diamonds were driven off of the planet in Steven and Connie's youth, they returned once more, embracing the power of this strange half-human. Connie had fought against Gems and corruption her entire life, but can she fight against the strongest being in the universe?





	Weaponized

**Author's Note:**

> This piece was inspired by the work of katietheslayer, and has been included in this story with her permission. You can find her on Tumblr at: http://katietheslayer.tumblr.com/ and support more amazing artwork!

* * *

 

Connie spat out blood onto the pristine tiles. Blue Diamond almost took a step back, but Yellow Diamond waved a hand in disgust.

“Enough,” she commanded. “Save some for him.”

The two guards who had held Connie let go, and the other uncurled her fists and stepped back as the woman fell forwards. Connie dug her fingernails into the floor, her breaths echoing in the chamber. Only empty space filled the dome, a giant amphitheater with stands filled with Gem nobles of all kind. A rainbow of hatred stared at the battered human before them. For all of them, it was the first time they had seen a human suffer first-hand.

“You…don’t you dare…”

Blue Diamond knelt with genuine curiosity. Her eyebrows narrowed at the tiny figure on the ground.

“You struggle against the inevitable. Why? Is it the human lifespan, its shortness, that draws you to the concept of eternity?” the noble said, gesturing to the golden band on Connie’s hand.

“Nothing lasts forever,” Yellow interjected, sneering at their captive, “but only for mortals. We define eternity! Your rebellions, you and those Crystal Gems, you are the catalysts of change, and that is what you become – _change_. Entropy. It is doom by default.”

Connie bared her teeth in frustration, wiping the sweat from underneath her swollen eye. It hurt to exist right now, but the fight moved her legs, pumping the muscles to push her upwards, standing before the Diamonds.

However long it had been since that Earth conflict, the Kindergarten War, Yellow Diamond had a point. She and her sister had not changed at all since the last time they had been pushed from the planet. Disgraced and displaced, the return to Homeworld must have been a tremendous exercise in diplomatic power. But then again, no Homeworld Gem dared defy the Diamonds in person.

All the gathered Gems knew that. And Connie fed off of the discomfort as she clenched her muscles and stared up at the massive rulers. Her throat was hoarse from all the yelling earlier, the fight against the Amethysts who had taken them. Steven’s name still boiled on her tongue, but her mouth was too dry to cry out again.

He had stared at her in shame and fear as they wrestled her from the beach to the ship. Separating them had made him start to fight. But all the Gem guards subduing Steven had the advantage of taking him away from her. Had they been together, that would have been a different fight entirely.

Her silence and stubborn posture seemed to do the job just fine. But she retracted her bravado as the Diamonds exchanged a look, and Yellow smirked confidently, while Blue let out what was – triumph? The demure ruler could never show that, not in a thousand years. Still, there it was, as she raised her hand and pointed to the center of the stage.

Behind Connie on the amphitheater’s main area, a circle appeared in the tiles and a column started to rise from the ground. The warrior instinctively reached for her sword, grasping the place where it had been confiscated. So, fists it was, then? She was still ready.

“You and that…thing can handle almost all the guards we can send at you,” Yellow Diamond declared. “But we know your breaking point. Such an obvious weakness – we had seen it before, and now we finally have the chance to turn it against you.”

Weakness? Connie turned to the column as a door opened in the side, a blinding light emerging from the center with waves of clouds rolling forth from the entrance. She covered her eyes with her arms, stumbling back onto her knees. When she opened her eyes to the ground, her stomach turned as she saw that the fog was pink.

“No… No, nonono, not this, not like this…”

Connie forced herself to stare agape at the vessel, blood dripping from the corner of her mouth and tears joining the flow. She could recognize the silhouette anywhere.

An unseen wind blew Steven’s mane around him, tangles of black as tall as him and glistening with power. Nanofibers of pinkness seemed to fun from his scalp to the end of his hair to make the darkness glow. His eyes glowed the brightest of all, hypnotically surreal and completely monochrome. As he came onto the platform and the column sank back down behind them, Connie saw the new jumpsuit outfit, steel and silver with black arm and leg bands. More neon leylines ran down Steven’s limbs, his hands gloved in the glow. Above his gemstone, the singular Diamond’s insignia was attached to his suit, glowing as smugly as the face of the diamonds behind them.

“There are things we could have never anticipated from Earth. We thought it impossible that there could be anything more powerful than what we could discover here. But you taught us the humanity of humility, and so, we saw,” Blue Diamond murmured. “This hybrid was an asset that we could not bear to let go.”

Connie tried to stand and fell backwards, crawling away from the monstrous man before him. All the strength she had drawn from before dissolved as she choked out wordless questions. The first and foremost, though, was obvious enough.

“We told him that if he complied, then we would send you back unharmed. Did he believe us? It doesn’t matter now. But, for what it’s worth, he doesn’t know that we do intent to keep that promise.”

Yellow Diamond snapped her fingers. “ _We_ are not going to touch you.”

Steven’s expressionless face turned to artificial anger, and he jumped above Connie, a fist raised in fury. She had a second to roll out of the way before her husband brought his knuckles down onto the tile. The stone shattered into uncountable pieces, sending cracks throughout the entire arena.

“Steven!”

Connie managed to scream out, scrambling to her feet.

“Steven, please! You…you need to come back!”

Each word made her mouth and throat burn up, and for all of her strength, the man before her only turned and stood stoically with nothing but uncontrolled embers in his eyes. His controllers had taken their seats, in their respective yellow and blue control chairs, each with a pearl on the armrest eyeing the spectacle.

Connie yelped as Steven suddenly leapt forwards, one hand extended outwards as he rushed her. The fingers suddenly closed around her throat, turning her gasp into a pitiful squeak. Something snapped in her shoulder as Steven tackled her to the ground, choking her and thudding perfectly on the amphitheater floor. Already, the silver unconscious started to flood Connie’s vision and the pain of her broken bones turned numb. Steven remained steadfast as his grip tightened.

She had to try one more time. Her voice was lost as the rest of the blood from her beating trickled out from her lips. Connie’s eyes started to roll back into her head as the drops sank to her neck, slipping underneath Steven’s fingers.

The warmth of the blood against his gloves seemed to give the man pause for thought. One of Steven’s eyes twitched, the muscles of his face almost attempting expression.

Yellow Diamond narrowed her eyes at the display.

“What is the meaning of this?” she hissed. “Kill her, you fool.”

But Steven did not. The grip loosened, and Connie fell back onto the cracked tiles with a rattling gasp. Her husband stared at his hand, the dark red against the pink glove. Turning his fingers, his eyes twitched once more as he saw the bulge in the fabric where they had forgotten to remove that ring. There was no marriage here. They couldn’t have known.

“What is he doing?” Blue Diamond wondered, tapping her fingers on her armchair impatiently.

Connie rolled to her side, as the pain of her broken arm started to come back. She could feel Steven stand up, still staring at his hand. She could feel his silence.

“Listen to your orders! Kill her!” Blue snapped.

Her voice was as calm and yet as irate as anyone could have heard. There were murmurs around the Gems surrounding them, and the anxiety zipped like a livewire from the leaders to their congregation.

“You…”

Connie stopped moving at the sound of Steven’s voice. The Diamonds’ expressions, for the first time, went from anger to shock, and a hint of fear of their own creation as the man turned to them with his head down.

The hybrid’s gemstone started to glisten, and once more his hair picked up and expanded with some unseen wind that started to pick up the rubble around them. A whirlwind of tile and dust circled Steven and Connie as he raised his hands, with his wife’s blood clenched in his fists. Steven raised his face, and the burn of his eyes turned to a blaze unseen by any Gem or human in existence. He opened his mouth, the sharpened enamel dripping with furious saliva. As he roared, electricity crackled through the air, each of his words accompanied with a surge of sparks. The last words the surrounding Gems ever heard vibrated throughout the windows before all the glass shattered around them:

“You

**hurt**

**_my  
  
_** ******_CONNIE!”_**


End file.
